Blue Moon Bistro, Dennis

I spent the week of my birthday on Cape Cod, which has become something of a tradition. On the weekends, we don't leave our neighborhood - it's not worth fighting the traffic - but during the week, we explore a bit afield. One day, we drove up 6A to the Cape Cod Museum of Art and a visit to my cousin's restaurant, Blue Moon Bistro.

Blue Moon Bistro has been open for a few years now, but I get to spend so little time down the Cape, I hadn't been able to stop by (although I have sent my blogging friends before). I'm glad we finally took the time, though, because it was an amazing meal that we're still talking about a couple of weeks later.

Note: My cousin Lisa usually does front of the house stuff, and her husband Peter is the chef, so I'm reviewing family here. But really, if I didn't like my meal, I just wouldn't write about it. While we were eating, the tables on both sides of us talked about how much they enjoyed the restaurant, and they were all repeat customers.

As we perused the menu, the bread basket was brought out. If I were to rank restaurants by how good their bread basket was (why don't I? This may be my new rating system), this would definitely be in the top five. Crispy breadsticks, crunchy cheese-topped crostini, and soft rosemary focaccia was served with a white bean dip and a duck liver pate with wine gelee. This and a cocktail alone would have equaled a pretty perfect dinner for me. But no, we made our choices and ordered our meals.

I started with a half order of lobster ravioli and would have eaten another whole order for my entree. I've ordered lobster ravioli at a lot of places, and I often find the actual lobster flavor lacking - not so here. I'm not sure what else was inside the pasta, but it tasted like lobster without anything getting in the way. It certainly didn't taste like filler. The pasta was lightly dressed in a lemony butter sauce that complimented the filling and that I sopped up with more bread.

My mother went with a goat cheese and beet salad, topped with candied walnuts, that she couldn't say enough good things about, and my dad ordered off the pre-theater menu, which is a great deal, and got a tomato soup.

Since we were on the Cape and Peter focuses on local ingredients as much as possible, I figured fish would be a good bet. I went with the local haddock, topped with olive tapenade and giant capers, and served with veggies and risotto-style wild rice. The fish itself was mild, so the olives gave it an unctuousness that would otherwise be missing. The vegetables were perfectly cooked and still had some body to them, and the rice - oh the rice. I'm not a big fan of rice (ask my mother how many times I've made pilaf, like the good Armenian girl I should be), but apparently cook it risotto-style and I'm in love. I scraped the plate clean. (My parents went with the sea bass and the beef tenderloin, but I was a little too focused on my own meal to pay much attention to theirs.)

I had planned on ordering dessert even though I was getting pretty full, because hey, it was my birthday! My father's prix fixe meal came with two little chocolate tarts. But just as we were discussing dessert, Peter sent out a cheese plate for us. I don't usually think of cheese as a dessert (unless we're talking about Fiore di Nonno's fig burrata, which is totally a dessert), but this was completely satisfying. As with most of the meal, many of the ingredients were local. The aged cheddar (back) and the goat cheese (black rind next to the flowers) were not too challenging, as cheeses go, but were just perfect. I loved the gooseberries (still in their husks) and the honeycomb that served as garnishes. This cheese plate was a main topic of conversation for two days after this meal. I don't know if there is normally a cheese plate on the menu, but there should be - the presentation was gorgeous and allowed the local ingredients to shine.

If Blue Moon Bistro were in Boston, they'd be getting their fair share of buzz, especially in the use of local ingredients and work with local farms, but the food scene on the Cape is much quieter. If you find yourself mid-Cape anytime (they're open year round), definitely make a stop for dinner.

Fair Trade Dinner at Tastings Wine Bar & Bistro

Hi, have we met? If we had, you'd know I love my coffee. I blame my aunt for taking me on summer walks to get iced coffee when I was a kid and my father for brewing multiple pots every morning. My friend Melody calls me a "champion" coffee drinker because I can slug down a cup like it's going out of style. So when Green Mountain Coffee (which I just visited in Vermont) got in touch with me about a series of Fair Trade events in Boston, I just had to find out more.

October is Fair Trade Month, and Green Mountain is calling attention to it through a new website, Eat, Drink, and Be Fair, and by hosting events in Boston, which will be declared a Fair Trade city in 2010. They have challenged a few local chefs to a Top Chef Masters-type event to cook with Fair Trade ingredients, which I'll write about next week.

I got the chance to attend something of a test run for one of the competitors, Chef Richard Garcia of Tastings Wine Bar & Bistro in Foxboro. Chef Garcia uses local or Fair Trade ingredients as much as possible in the restaurant, so he seems like a perfect choice to create a Fair Trade dinner. In fact, he took the coffee theme all the way and included coffee in each of the courses, and not in typical ways like crusting a steak in coffee. The dishes were interesting and adventurous and absolutely delicious.

To be honest, when I sat down and saw our menu for the evening, I was not excited. There was nothing (not one thing) that I would ever order. But I figured I could at least enjoy the wine and coffee and then find something to eat when I got home. But then something miraculous happened - I loved almost every single thing presented to me. If the regular menu at Tastings is anything like this, I wouldn't hesitate to go back.

We started with a sea urchin cappuccino, served in the sea urchin shell. In reality, it was a creamy parsnip soup, blended with local sea urchin and coffee used instead of stock, and topped with a vanilla froth. The sea urchin lent a bit of umami to the puree, and the sweetness and creaminess of the parsnip combined with the coffee was definitely reminiscent of a cappuccino. I would have licked the bowl clean if it hadn't have been for the sharp spikes.

Next up was coffee cured Hamachi, topped with a grapefruit vanilla citrette, heirloom red peppers, Marcona almonds, and fennel fronds. The fish was sweet and tender, and the almonds on top served as a crunchy foil to the rest of the dish.

The main entree was duck two ways, highlighting a delicious heirloom breed of duck. Lola ducks are deep red in color and taste more like pork or beef (at least to me) than duck. Chef Garcia describes them here on his blog. The coffee-smoked duck breast was like a nice steak - juicy and meaty and satisfying. The real star of the dish, though, was the confit leg with French roast duck jus. It was so tender and perfectly salty - it reminded me a bit of corned beef or pot roast.

Dessert was the weakest part of the meal, but it still had its strong points. The highlight was coffee- and cardamom-infused dates. Cardamom is often added to coffee in the Middle East (in the Boston area, I know Karoun in Newton serves their coffee this way), and the dates were a great vehicle for these flavors. I could have eaten a whole plate of just the dates. They were served with a coffee gel which was perhaps a little too solid - I was hoping for something more like Durgin Park's coffee jello. But did I mention those dates?

During the meal, we were accompanied by Sandy Yusen, director of PR for Green Mountain Coffee. We spent the whole evening discussing fair trade and local foods (and, well, food in general). After dinner, Sandy walked us through a cupping, or tasting, of two different types of Green Mountain Fair Trade coffee. I enjoyed tasting the Kenyan and the Sumatran side-by-side because I got a much better sense of how they compared to each other. Sandy explained that coffee has about twice the flavor compounds of wine, so using wine tasting techniques can help with identifying flavors. The Kenyan was bright and acidic and earthy, and Sandy compared it to a sourdough bread, while the Sumatran was more full-bodied with a warm and round flavor, more like a Russian rye bread. I'm so used to doctoring up my coffee that actually tasting the profile of the coffee was a nice change - I might have to do cuppings more often!

I'll write more about Fair Trade next week after the Eat, Drink, and Be Fair event. To learn more about Fair Trade, visit the Eat, Drink, and Be Fair website and take the pledge.

Cheap Eats: Dorado Tacos & Cemitas

Brookline is certainly not lacking in Mexican food, and with the opening of Dorado Tacos & Cemitas one week ago, the pool of offerings has gotten richer, not more crowded. The restaurant, located in JFK Crossing on Harvard Ave, is bright and sunny, with a focus on high quality ingredients and eco-friendly materials.

The menu at Dorado is heavily focused on tacos. They offer a variety of types, including 4 different fish tacos, all with their own combination of proteins and condiments. The salsas, guacamole, and veggies are all fresh, making each bite shine with flavor. The tacos run about $2.50 each, which is a little high, but the quality of all the ingredients makes you forget the price tag. Three tacos would be enough for a meal, or try the taco plate for $6, with your choice of two tacos, perfectly cooked black beans, Mexican rice, and a whole charred jalapeno. This Bostonist recommends the shrimp taco, heaped with beer-battered shrimp, thin slices of jicama, orange salsa, and Baja crema.


The menu is filled with other options as well. The cemitas, Mexican sandwiches for $6, combine your choice of protein (chorizo, pork Milanesa, and portabella mushroom are just some of the options) with black beans, chipotles en adobo, avocado, Oaxaca cheese, and cilantro on a sesame seed roll. Take out a whole rotisserie chicken, with a nine spice and citrus marinade, for $10, or enjoy a half rotisserie chicken plate, with black beans, rice, and corn tortillas for $7. Dorado also offers salads (Caesar or chopped chicken), definitely big enough for a meal. And don't forget to order a side of elote - grilled corn with mayo, ancho chile, lime, and cotija cheese. It's not quite as transcendent as the version at Toro, but it's definitely a fantastic side dish or snack.

Dorado Tacos & Cemitas is located at 401 Harvard Street in Brookline. They are open daily from 11am to 10pm.

Originally published on Bostonist.

Blogger Dinner at Tavolo, Dorchester

High ceilings, large windows letting in plenty of light, long red curtains, cool swirly globe lamps, and one of the coolest wall murals I've seen in a long time all set the stage for a fantastic meal at Tavolo in Dorchester. The restaurant, which mostly has a name as a pizza place, hosted a dinner for ten bloggers last night, and they really took the chance to showcase some of their dishes that stray away from pizza and pasta.

I took a seat facing the wall, and usually I wouldn't spend so much time avoiding my dining companions, but the wall murals by local artist Kiki Ikura were just tremendous - it looked like chalk on a blackboard, but was smudgeless, and was whimsical and lighthearted without being silly or childish. She painted two walls like this, using a cherry picker to get all the way up to the ceiling, and they murals give a lot of life to the room and the restaurant.

We started off with a light salad of watermelon, feta, lemon, olive oil, mint, and basil. Watermelon and feta are really an amazing combination, and this version of the dish was a perfect balance of sweet and salty and tart. I even sopped up the leftover juices with a slice of bread.

Next was gnocchi alla Gricia, little puffs of potato with pancetta, pecorino, and local fava beans. I guess I've had too many bad renditions of gnocchi - hard, dense, gummy, or just gross - but these were fantastic. They were light and fluffy, didn't stick to my teeth, and soaked up just enough of the sauce to take on the flavors without becoming too sticky. The pancetta and pecorino added salt and umami, and the fava beans were a nice surprise of bright, fresh flavor. I would have been content to just eat a big bowl of this and call it a night...

We also enjoyed a taste of the house's meatballs, which were amazing. They were homey and evenly spiced, and the tomato sauce they came in was something that the chef had obviously spent a long time cooking. On the regular menu, the meatballs feature prominently - they can be added to many of the pasta dishes, or can be front-and-center in a panini. Definitely a dish to take advantage of.

After the gnocchi and meatballs, we moved on to a swordfish involtini. This was one of the many things that were on our menu that I would never order, but yet greatly enjoyed the way it was cooked at Tavolo. I'm just not a fan of swordfish - but after eating this, I think it may be because it is usually served in thick steaks without much seasoning, which brings out the fishy flavor to me. The involtini was a thin slice of fish, wrapped around a mash of fontina, garlic, and parsley. It was so tasty, in fact, that I cleaned the plate. (Note for my parents, who are undoubtedly going to read this and think swordfish is now my favorite fish: Unless you wrap it around cheese and garlic, I don't want it.)

Next up was a roast duck breast, served over faro and fresh string beans, with a little bit of red currant jam. Duck is another thing I don't like, but this rendition was nicely cooked and had a delightful crispy skin. The beans were perfectly cooked - still crispy, but not raw, and with enough salt to really bring out their flavor.

By then, we were all stuffed, but still felt the need for something sweet to wrap up the meal. We were served a blueberry "Genetti" cake - toasted blueberry pound caked with a touch of whipped cream and a light blueberry sauce. (For those of you keeping track at home, blueberries are another food I can't stand, but were very actually quite tasty in this form.) I absolutely loved that the cake was toasted - the edges were crisp and almost caramelized, which took something simple like pound cake to a whole different level.

Looking more closely at my menu and the restaurant's regular menu, I see that almost all of what we ate is not on the regular menu. That being said, each and every bite was delicious, and I'm sure the regular offerings are just as good. Tavolo is really trying to get away from their image as "just" a pizza place, and if the dishes I tried were any indication, they are definitely doing a great job of it.

Cheap Eats: Excelsior

Excelsior may not seem like the type of place to find cheap food, but at the downstairs bar, there are always surprises to be had. Be it $1 oysters (on Tuesdays and Wednesdays), half-priced pizzas (on Sundays and Mondays), or their new Winter Warmer Suppers, the deals at Excelsior's bar offer gourmet food at very low prices.

The Winter Warmer Suppers are a new special that features a different comfort food each week, changing on Saturdays, for only $8. This week's feature is fish and chips with cole slaw and house tartar sauce. The white fish is tender and coated with a light and crispy batter. The large-cut fries have creamy interiors and act as a perfect vehicle for enjoying every last bite of the house-made tartar sauce. Even the cole slaw won over this slaw-hater, with its crunchy cabbage and carrots and its creamy and tangy sauce. Sprinkled with fried parsley leaves and a good dose of black pepper, this is one of the best fish & chips that this Bostonist has had in a long time.

Future Winter Warmer Suppers will include Venison Stroganoff (1/17-23), Buttermilk Fried Chicken (1/24-30), Beef Stew (1/31-2/6), and Lamb Shepherds Pie (2/7-13). Excelsior is located at 272 Boylston Street, across from the Public Garden. Food is served in the bar area Monday-Thursday, 4:30-11pm, Friday and Saturday, 4:30-11:30pm, and Sunday, 4:30-10pm.

Originally posted on Bostonist.

Cheap Eats: The Battery

For a city known for its seafood, you would think that really good fish and chips would be easy to find in Boston. Unfortunately, this hasn't been the case. At least, until The Battery opened in Brighton Center three weeks ago.

Run by transplants from Cork, Ireland, this is the closest Boston has to the chip shops that are so easy to find across the pond. The menu is pretty basic - fries and battered things like fish and sausages. You can order a la carte or put together a supper with a main, fries, and a choice of peas, coleslaw, curry, or gravy. The fish (pollack) supper, shown above, is gigantic for only $8.95 - you really need to be starving to be able to put all this food away. The fish is flaky and steaming inside the crisp crust, and the hand cut chips are superbly crunchy on the outside and smooth on the inside. They're best enjoyed piping hot, though, as they lose some of their integrity as they cool. The Battery also offers Irish drinks, like Club Orange and Club Lemon, Lilt, Lucozade, and Ribena, if you want a truly authentic meal.

The Battery is located at 379 Washington Street in Brighton. They are open Sunday through Tuesday, 11am to 11pm, and Wednesday through Saturday, 11am to 1am.

Originally posted on Bostonist.